Traced back thousands of years, ice has been used to chill food and drink. Often it was only available to the world\u2019s aristocrats and privileged. The first possible record of shaved ice in the world leads back to China in 1100 BC! As this commodity became more readily available, how did it morph into this delicious shave ice treat we enjoy today? Are there other delicious, rainbow-colored shaved ice treats on the other side of the world?<\/p>\n
There are differing opinions out there on where it all started, but what we do know is that even with each country\u2019s unique renditions of the beloved shave ice there are always a couple defining characteristics of shaved ice.<\/p>\n
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Let\u2019s take a quick trip around the world and look into what makes each country\u2019s shaved ice dessert a speciality to the locals.<\/p>\n
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Recorded in history as one of the oldest shaved ice delicacies \u2013 China\u2019s baobing and Taiwan\u2019s xue hua bing are icy, tropical hits.<\/p>\n
Typical additions include:<\/p>\n
Taiwanese shaved ice is known to be made out of a milk or cream base that makes it lush and creamy. It has a distinctive ribbon look by the way it gets shaved.<\/p>\n
Modern ice shops have a variety of fun flavors\/toppings that include<\/p>\n
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Speculated as one of the origins of shave ice \u2013 Japan\u2019s kakigori found its place during the warm seasons and as a staple matsuri food, or festival foods.<\/p>\n
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The traditional kakigori, ujikintoki kakigori consists of fluffy, snow-like shave ice topped with:<\/p>\n
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Japan has syrups similar to Hawaiian shaved ice flavors as well as some special syrups including:<\/p>\n
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Japan\u2019s modern ice shops also do a variety of different toppings and designs. One other special type of kakigori is a shirokuma style which means \u201cpolar bear\u201d in Japanese, toppings will often be arranged into the shape of a bear\u2019s face.<\/p>\n
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First recorded during the Joseon Dynasty (1392 \u2013 1897), Korea\u2019s patbingsu delighted the elite members of society during hot summer months. The traditional patbingsu was complete with just three toppings:<\/p>\n
Other variations or bingsu have additional\/different toppings and syrups such as<\/p>\n
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Sporting a couple different names, Malaysia\u2019s best known shaved ice: ais kacang is also sometimes called air batu campar (\u201cmixed ice\u201d) or ABC for short. \u201cKacang\u201d means nuts, so one popular topping spotted on ais kacang is peanuts along with:<\/p>\n
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Very similar to Malaysia\u2019s ais kacang, Indonesia\u2019s es campur has common toppings such as:<\/p>\n
Es campur is unique feature is its signature neon-pink color thanks to a certain syrup.<\/p>\n
Moving along southeast Asia, Thailand joins the crowd with their shaved ice, nam kang sai. With plenty of ingredients ready to mix and match just like other shaved ices we\u2019ve explored, nam kang sai has toppings such as:<\/p>\n
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We\u2019ve named just a few of possible ingredients to choose from and if you\u2019re feeling choice overload, we understand. Another way to order nam kang sai is asking for nam kang sai ruam mit. Which is basically the vendor\u2019s choice to mix what they want for you.<\/p>\n
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If you\u2019re ready to mix things up, the Philippines\u2019 shaved ice dessert halo-halo will do just that! \u201cHalo\u201d in Tagalog means \u201cmix\u201d, and that means mixing the popular purple colored ube halaya or ube jam with any of the following:<\/p>\n
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Halo-halo is a childhood hodgepodge of brightly colored deliciousness.<\/p>\n
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Is your mouth watering like ours yet? Hang tight as we make our way over to Puerto Rico to check out their piragua. Typically sold by street hawkers or piragueros, piragua has fruit flavors such as:<\/p>\n
It is usually just eaten straight from the cup or sipped through a straw.<\/p>\n
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Our last and final stop, paying tribute to our favourite, Hawaii. Hawaiian shave ice was introduced as Japanese immigrants travelled to Hawaii to work on sugar plantations. Much finer and more powdery than sno-cones or snow cones, there are also more exotic flavors to choose from like:<\/p>\n
To check out even more shaved ice flavors read what Real Hawaiian Ice has to offer here.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Traced back thousands of years, ice has been used to chill food and drink. Often it was only available to the world\u2019s aristocrats and privileged. The first possible record of shaved ice in the world leads back to China in 1100 BC! As this commodity became more readily available, how did it morph into this …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1036,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\n